Tag Archives: Africa

Running the Numbers: Chinese Social Media and Dangote Industries

September 6, 2013 rachel_eaton Leave a comment

Tom Griffiths

Last week, we at Gong were treated to a lunchtime talk by Jonathan Smith of Hot Pot Digital. Jonathan runs a bespoke service, representing a number of the UK’s brands on Chinese social media sites like Sina’s Weibo (China’s Twitter-equivalent in both micro-blog format and number of users). His talk raised a question in my mind: what share of voice does African business news have on Chinese social media channels, as compared with Twitter?

China-Africa trade receives a lot of attention, both positive and negative, in English and French social media. Simply search for the words “China” and “Nigeria” on Twitter and receive a stream of news, statistics and viewpoints. This is of little surprise given China’s perceived importance in many of Africa’s economies. I was interested if a similar ‘conversation’ exists on Weibo.

The story I decided to test my hypothesis on was this week’s news that Dangote Industries, a Nigerian Conglomerate, intends to invest US$9billion in building the country’s biggest oil refinery along with petrochemical and fertiliser plants. Dangote Industries’ founder, Aliko Dangote, announced that his company will be putting up US$3 billion and seeking US$6 billion in loan capital.

My admittedly less than rigorous method of investigation was to compare mentions of “Dangote” on Twitter with mentions of “Dān gē tè (丹格特)” on Weibo over the 5^th of September. Before going into the findings I would like to note that I recognise Twitter is widely used in Nigeria when compared with Weibo. I have looked at geo-tagged tweets from users outside of Nigeria to try to negate this bias however I realise any findings were always going to be heavily weighted towards Twitter.

The results: Weibo had only two posts that mentioned the story. Both simply stated the facts without commentary and provided a link to a longer write up. Both posts were made by petroleum industry trade publication’s Twitter accounts. Twitter, on the other hand, held a huge number of tweets on the news. Many of these came from Nigeria, however there were also many hundreds from Kenya, the US, Britain and Indonesia. Most tweets simply restated the facts, however a number commented on the potential job creation of the new factories.

The results were striking, even with the obvious bias in the experiment: 2 Weibo posts compared with thousands of tweets. It seems that the new Nigerian refinery just wasn’t a talking point on Weibo, despite the resource trade between China and Africa being so well publicised. However, as many African countries’ economies rise, will we see an increase in discussions on African business on Weibo?

It would be interesting to repeat the test on a piece of news that directly involves both China and an African country: an experiment for a later day.

Insight

Homestrings wins at Africa Diaspora Awards 2013

May 3, 2013 rachel_eaton Leave a comment

Sarah Caddy

Pride of heritage was the flavour of the evening at the Africa Diaspora awards, held in London’s West End on 2 May 2013.

The continent had much to celebrate, with awards presented to the brightest and best from the worlds of Business, Academia, Entrepreneurship, Media and Community. Her Excellency Ms Thandi Modise, Premier of North – West Province, Republic of South Africa, set the tone for the evening with a moving speech on the role played by the African Diaspora in securing the continent’s successful future. “The spirit of internationalism has sustained humanity” she proclaimed, vocally grateful for the benefits that a global perspective can have not only for the individual Diasporans, but also for the separate countries within the continent. Her vision was for a continent that works with its neighbours and international allegiances to build an ever more promising future.

A prime example of her vision in practice is Eric Vincent Guichard, who secured the Entrepreneur of the Year award for his online initiative, Homestrings – an investment platform that facilitates Diaspora investments into their own communities. It was an award we thoroughly toasted, as well deserved of our client!

Insight

President Mahama’s message at The Times CEO Summit Africa was very clear: Invest in people and infrastructure

April 30, 2013 rachel_eaton Leave a comment

Isabelle Alenus-Crosby

Africa’s future as the world’s economic engine rests on investing in its one billion people, President Mahama of Ghana said in a speech at The Times CEO Summit Africa today. “Investments should focus on people, providing them with jobs”.

Mr Mahama delivered his keynote address at the third CEO Summit Africa, which is held every year in London. The two-day summit which was held on April 29^th and 30^th this year, brought together Chief Executives of Africa’s biggest businesses with International Investors. The President’s address also focussed on Ghana’s readiness for business and the opportunities available for partnership with its private sector to expand the infrastructure base of the country.

Most of the continent is going through an unprecedented period of stability whilst an economic revolution is sweeping across it. With more investors coming in every day, Mr Mahama shouldn’t worry. Africa’s equity markets are hot and a virtuous cycle has already emerged. And the good news doesn’t end there. The Economist reported at the start of 2013 that a rapid increase across the full investment spectrum is expected within the next couple of years. People across Africa therefore have good reason to be optimistic. According to the IMF, 84% believe that they’ll be better off in two years.

Another possibility, of course, is that they’ll be much better off.

Insight

African GDP – growing faster than previously thought?

January 7, 2013 rachel_eaton Leave a comment

Isabelle Alenus-Crosby

There have been various reports in the news lately that the impressive GDP statistics posted by countries across Africa may actually be underestimations, and that the continent’s outlook could be even better than previously thought.

GDP growth is correlated to a variety of data, and if this data is sparse (which is still very much the case across Africa), whole swathes of economic activity can be overlooked. Simply put, growth is measured by comparing current data to the base year. But without sufficient data, many “new” sectors, such as mobile telephony, have nothing to be compared to. And these new sectors have been growing quickly and steadily across the entire continent for almost a decade.

Until 2010, Ghana was using a 1993 base year. When it was finally revised by the statistical office, GDP estimates rose by over 60 %, translating to approximately 13bn USD of economic activity. Nigeria’s base year is still set at 1990. An upward revision is therefore imminent and likely to be even more impressive than Ghana’s. In fact, economists are predicting that the GDP for the whole of sub-Saharan Africa will rise by at least 15 % in the next couple of years! Where’s the champagne?

Part of The Wilful Group